Released July 11, 2007

MANHATTAN, Kan. – Let´s go to a courtroom in Wichita. One of the attorneys is wearing a sharp-looking, custom-made, hand-designed pair of leather suspenders. And where would you think that these leather suspenders came from? Would you believe, a cowboy craftsman in the corner of Kansas? It´s a long way from cowboy crafts to the courthouse, but this rural business has made the trip.

Buck Rowland is the owner of Buckaroos Saddle and Tack in Arma, Kan. Arma is a town of 1,504 people. That´s rural - but there´s more.

Buck Rowland was born in Pittsburg and raised in southeast Kansas. He spent lots of time on his grandparents´ farm and found that he loved the outdoors. Buck learned to ride horses, work cattle, hunt and fish and trap. He worked as a cowboy and also learned to cut hair. After high school in Arma, he became a licensed barber at a school in Wichita before going into the U.S. Army in 1969.

When he got out of the Army, Buck went back to his work of cowboying and barbering in a rural setting. He says, "I got out of the Army on a Friday and on Tuesday, I was looking for a horse trailer and I met a man who had a colt for sale. I bought that colt, trained him, and rode him for the next 20 years."

Buck set up a barber shop and tack store in the southern Flint Hills town of Edna, population 418 people. Now, that´s rural. From this location, he was able to work as both a cowboy and a barber, and also do some fur trapping. He ran a 50 mile trap line, getting up at 4 a.m. to check traps, working all day till dark, and then staying up half the night skinning and scraping hides. Buck says with a smile, "That´s young man´s work."

Next door to his business was a hardware store with some old sewing machines and shoe repair equipment. Buck says, "The lady who owned the hardware store would let me go in there and work with those old machines." He started doing repair work on his own leather goods and tack, and then repairing things for other people. An older man came to help him and taught him about working with leather.

Because of his interest in trapping, Buck went to a trapper´s convention in Kentucky one year. He says, "There was a big mountain man camp there, with people throwin´ tomahawks and doing all kinds of outdoor things." It looked like fun, so Buck got involved in mountain man reenactments. He traveled to black powder rendezvous in Colorado, New Mexico, and Missouri and participated in mountain man events that were so authentic that only clothing and equipment of early 1800s design was allowed. Buck says, "You couldn´t bring a match."

He also got involved in trapshooting. One year he won third place at the amateur trapshooting association national meet.

Back in Arma, Buck acquired better equipment and grew his leather products business. He had the advantage of knowing first hand what cowboys and outdoorsmen needed and he knew about working with hides and skins. Buck started to design leather goods of his own. Today, Buckaroo´s Saddle and Tack does leather repair and offers a full line of western tack, plus Old West reproductions of clothing and equipment.

Buck designs and creates custom made leather goods of all kinds, from jackets to chaps to quivers to holsters to headstalls. He sells his products plus an extensive inventory of related goods at some 20 trade shows each year, in Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Missouri. Buck says, "If it´s made out of leather, we´ve probably made it." He says, "For me, a highlight is when you make something that looks good and people really appreciate it when they buy it." Buck can be contacted at 620-347-4602.

It´s time to leave this courtroom in Wichita, where an attorney sports a beautiful set of leather suspenders, handmade at Buckaroo´s Saddle and Tack. We commend Buck Rowland for making a difference with his hard work and craftsmanship in a lifetime of leather.

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http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/news/sty/KSProfile.htm

Contact: Ron Wilson,(785) 532-7690, rwilson@ksu.edu